The article in question appears to draw upon a first draft report by the Comptroller and Auditor General in which the expenditure for each college was divided by provisional full-time equivalent student numbers to arrive at the cost per student. Such an arithmetic exercise on provisional figures is of very limited use and can be very misleading. The cost per student betwen colleges can be affected by a number of factors, for instance, the spread and nature of the courses, the relative balance between part-time and full-time students, the balance between laboratory and non-laboratory based activity and the level of provision for apprentices, undergraduates and post-graduates.
The annual budget allocation by my Department takes into account the complexity of the particular institution and the range of courses and facilities offered to students (both full-time and part-time). Following a review of the 1997 allocation for the technological sector generally and as an indication of commitment to the development of WIT, it was decided to increase the total budget for 1997 for WIT to over £14 million. This represented an increase in £1 million over the 1996 budget for WIT.
The allocations to WIT for 1996 and 1997 are shown in the following table.
